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WordPress 3.8 Parker was released only a few days ago on December 12th, 2013 and the latest iteration of the world's most popular blogging and content management system has just gotten a major backend design update. Checkout the refresh below when I updated one of my other websites, CarNewsCafe.

WordPress 3.8 Oscar

The new WordPress dashboard and backend is much cleaner and seems to be more inline with how a lot of WordPress themes look nowadays. I imagine this is not a coincidence on the part of Automattic, the company that handles WordPress development.

The new backend uses Open Sans font, which most people probably didn't know about but it works well in the WordPress dashboard. The idea is to make things less cluttered and easier to read and manage. In addition icons have been updated and they are now vector based which means they can scale to your screen. That means they load faster and work better.

Dashboard Color Schemes

In addition to the udpated look you now have options in terms of what colors you want the WordPress dashboard to look like. There are currently 8 options to choose from which includes Default, Light, Blue, Coffee, Ectoplasm, Midnight, Ocean, and Sunrise. The idea is to provide more options and better contrast to be easier on the eyes for WordPress users and admins.

If you have a WordPress website that a lot of different people access, a user can individually choose what WordPress dashboard color scheme they prefer. A pretty cool update to the backend.

WordPress Twenty Fourteen ‘Magazine' Theme

For WordPress 3.8 Parker there is also a new theme called Twenty Fourteen (2014). It has the layout of a magazine which seems to be what a lot of people use WordPress for. The new theme is by far the cleanest default WordPress theme Automattic has come out with.

Other WordPress 3.8 Improvements

In addition to all these cool updates to WordPress 3.8 Parker there are several other nice updates. This includes better theme management which allows you to see more advanced previews of themes you might want to switch to. Also the widget menu is easier to handle.

It seems that the WordPress team also has improved the functionality of WordPress for mobile phones and tablets. Creating and managing posts should be easy no matter what device you are using now.

There are other WordPress tweaks you might notice too. For instance if you check your plugins page eeactivted plugins are highlighted in white while active plugins are in blue. (I personally find this confusing.) Also there is no “Quickpress” in the WordPress dashboard anymore and in it's place you will find a “Quick Draft” box.

At first I was apprehensive about the WordPress 3.8 update since I've been using WordPress for awhile. Automattic didn't change too much and they make ease-of-use a top priority unlike a lot of other open source software. After a few days I really like the updated WordPress dashboard and backend. It is definitely faster and snappy and I imagine that Automattic developers worked hard on improving the WordPress core code to achieve this in addition to reworking the design. Kudos to everyone that contributed to WordPress 3.8 Parker.

By the way WordPress 3.8 was codenamed “Parker ” after the great Alto saxophone player, Charlie Parker. Matt Mullenweg, the creator of WordPress, likes to use Jazz musicians to codename WordPress releases since he is Alto saxophone player. WordPress 3.6 Oscar was named for Oscar Peterson and WordPress 3.7 Basie was named after Count Basie. Matt Mullenweg and these these other Jazz giants might be great musicians but they don't have singing dogs. 🙂

If you haven't updated you WordPress website(s) or blog(s) to WordPress 3.8 I would recommend you do it to enjoy the new features. I would encourage you to make a backup of your WordPress installations before you pupated though. You never know what might happen in an update and it is always a smart precaution.

If you are used WordPress 3.8 Parker are you thoughts about the updated and new dashboard? Do you love it or hate it?

I recently got asked, “Should I switch from Blogger to WordPress?” The short answer to this often asked question I get is, “Yes” you definitely should. WordPress is a superior and much better blogging platform and content management system than Blogger. There are a lot more features and 3rd party supported plugins which make the functionality of WordPress 1000 times better than Blogger probably ever will be. Honestly I could go on for a long time listing reasons why you should switch from Blogger to WordPress.

Even if WordPress is a better blog software to use I don't' necessarily see a reason for everyone to make the migration over to WordPress. It sort of depends on your needs and goals with your blog.

Most people use Blogger for their blogs since they just wanted something quick and easy. Since Blogger integrates with Google and all of their products it definitely is simple to use. A lot of Blogger blogs are mainly for sharing family photos, updates, and happenings privately with a family and friends. Or it was something that was just needed for a short time period of time and it wasn't worth it to register a domain name to use and buy web hosting. Other examples would be classes, soccer teams, school projects community bulletins, etc. In my opinion if this is what you are using Blogger for you may not want to hassle with switching from Blogger to WordPress.

Blogger also runs in a cloud environment which makes it a stable software and secure blog platform. (WordPress.com does as but self hosted WordPress blogs depend on what host you are using.) While it definitely doesn't have as much functionality and there are not as much 3rd party development going on with Blogger it is still a great platform for those that want something simple.

If you've landed on this article I am going to assume you are considering switching from Blogger to WordPress and you've probably read about Google's changed Terms of Service. Google's changed ToS basically states you may not own the content you make, which some people don't really like. Even Matt Cutts, Google's head of WebSpam, uses WordPress over Blogger. I wouldn't be surprised if Google's ToS was one of the reasons.

Also if keeping up a blog and your website is taking up more of your time and you looking for ways to monetize it, than you definitely are going to have to switch. WordPress has a lot of plugin options and greater flexibility for you to try different ways to make money blogging. Blogger has Google AdSense for monetizing a blog and that's about it except for getting private banner ads. Keep in mind your theme would need to be able to handle placing them.

If you do want to switch from Blogger to WordPress Automattic, the company that developed and maintains WordPress, makes the process pretty straightforward and easy. There is a Blogger Importer plugin which should work without a hitch (most of the time.) There are a few issues I've had when helping clients switch over to WordPress to be aware of though. For instance high quality images can be a bit of a pain especially if the person is picked a bad web host. (Most of the time HostGator or an EIG company.) Usually even with a lot of images and posts there are a few plugins for grabbing images and pulling them which make the process easier.

If you are happy with Blogger and it fits your needs for a personal or family blog and you are happy with it I don't see a reason to spend time switching to WordPress. If you want greater functionality and flexibility a switch from Blogger to WordPress is probably in the cards for you.

I'd love to hear from my audience. Have any of my readers made the switch? Was it hard or easy for you? Have you switched a blog or website over from other CMS platforms? Let me know in the comments below.

WordPress 3.7 Basie was just released and while they are not as many upgrades to WordPress 3.7 as there was in WordPress 3.6, the world's most popular content management system (CMS) just keeps getting better and better. New and notable features in WordPress 3.7 Basie includes;

Automatic WordPress Updates

Maintenance and security releases in WordPress 3.7 are automatic and most sites will be able to apply updates in the background. Wordpress updates are also now a lot more secure and reliable, according to Automattic developers, with new checks and safeguards.

Some configurations will still require more manual updates though. System administrators and WordPress developers can fine tune controls though for major releases and automatic plugin updates. This should save a lot of people time and hassle.

WordPress Search Results Improved

If you are using the WordPress search system to find posts and content on your website and have been frustrated with the fact it sorts articles by date, they've changed it. Search queries are based on how well the keywords match the relevant content and post titles and now will not be sorted by dates.

Advanced search queries are also supported. What does that mean? Only want to see posts that went love on specific date or date range? This will make finding older content a lot easier.

Stronger Passwords

Having a strong password is important and WordPress developers thinks so too. The WordPress password meter has been updated in WordPress 3.7 to recognize popular mistakes that can weaken a site's password. What does this include? Names, keyboard patterns (123456789), and even pop culture references will be considered “Weak” under the WordPress password meter now.

Better WordPress Support in Foreign Languages

Do you speak another language besides English? You will be happy to hear that WordPress will receive faster and more complete translations in foreign languages. WordPress 3.7 has added support for automatically installing the correct language files and keeps these language files updated. This make it easier to manage a WordPress site in a foreign language for millions of WordPress users around the world. “Parlez vous Francais?”

WordPress Multisite

wp_get_sites()

Allows those running WordPress Multisite installations allows developers and administrators of large WP Multisite installations to get an idea of all the sites on the network. This makes so that you do need to do do a direct database query to get that information.

WordPress 3.7 Basie

It should be noted that WordPress 3.7 Basie is named in honor of the Jazz great Count Basie. Since Matt Mullenweg, the creator of WordPress, is a Jazz saxophone player this isn't surprising. WordPress 3.6 Oscar was codenamed after the Jazz pianist Oscar Peterson.

What's impressive about the WordPress 3.7 launch is the timetable of it's release. Wordpress 3.6 was unveiled at the 2013 State of the Word at released at the beginning of August, 2013. For WordPress 3.8 Automattic anticipates it will release in December which is just 2 months away.

What do you think of WordPress 3.7 Basie? Are you hoping for any new features in WordPress 3.8?

Lately I've been trying out some different free and open source email list management software. Most have some issues though which makes going with a paid email service seem like a better option. However I have found a nice free email list manager most people will like, Dada Mail.

For those that follow my blog (you should because it is awesome) might have seen I tried using Mailman and phpList. The issue with Mailman was that it was just too time consuming for me to figure out how to setup and configure it to send out an email newsletter. It's clearly not meant for ‘regular people' if you know what I meant.

Rather than spending all my time configuring an email list manger nobody wants to use, I decided to give phpList a try since it pegs itself as the “Most Popular Open Source Newsletter Manager.” What I didn't realize when I installed is that the version I installed was several generations old. HostGator doesn't support the latest phpList version with their script installer QuickInstall and Fantastico doesn't either. I had to use another hosting account I have that had Softaculous which had the latest version of phpList. (QuickInstall and Fantastico also don't support the latest version of Dada Mail by the way.) I can manually install scripts I just don't usually feel like it.

When I got latest version of phpList installed I honestly preferred the older version I had used. I felt it worked better even if it was not pretty. There were also some things that annoyed me about phpList in general, but I'll save that for another post.

I decided that I would give Dada Mail a go since it seemed easier to use than Mailman or phpList. Besides from what I can tell nowadays you either go with phpList or Dada Mail if you want run an email newsletter from your own hosting account.

Dada Mail Pros

Dada Mail comes with a lot of great features which includes closed loop-opt-in, message archiving, sharing via RSS feeds, individual subscribers can edit their profiles, email analytics, and a lot of other cool stuff. Some features I like about is that you can invite subscribers from the dashboard and it is easy setup batch emails so your host doesn't get upset and ban your account for sending to many emails per hour.

What's great about Dada Mail is that the setup and install are relatively easy. It should not be too hard for people to configure email lists with Dada Mail. In addition the layout and interface is quite easy-to-use and understand. You should be ok figuring things out on your own after spending a bit of time in the Dada Mail dashboard.

Even if you are having trouble and need help with something Justin, the developer, is pretty good about answering support questions and helping people via the Dada Mail support forum. You will probably find most questions you would have there in the forums. Justin also has a service where you can pay him to install and configure Dada Mail on your server for you. Surprised more developers don't offer this service actually, as it's a great idea.

There are some, but not a lot, of Dada Mail tutorial videos on YouTube under the username “leaddadaist” which is the official channel. Unfortunately the videos are hot in HD and the resolution only goes up to 360p which can make it a bit difficult to watch.

Compared to phpList and Mailman I think Dada Mail is definitely an easier-to-use web based email manager.

Dada Mail Cons

Dada Mail is free and open source but the free version only allows for 3 email lists and up to 1,000 subscribers. After that you can either pay for a yearly Pro Dada Mail subscription which costs $34.95 or a Lifetime subscription for $74.95. Then your email list Quota is unlimited. Paying for a Pro Dada Mail license also allows you to remove links back to Dada Mail sites in emails generated by the program to my understanding. There are a few other benefits as well.

For those that like using WordPress, the CMS this site uses, there is no WordPress plugin. I emailed Justin and he said at this time there is not a plan to develop a WP plugin for Dada Mail. WordPress runs 18.9% of the web and 176,000 people download WordPress files everyday (this statistic only includes manual file downloads and not automatic script installs.) It would be a great for there to be a plugin to easily integrate Dada Mail with WordPress in my opinion. Maybe Justin can run a Kickstarter or IndieGoGo to raise funds for a Dada Mail WP plugin as I imagine he's gotten other requests for it.

One thing that concerns me about Dada Mail is that it is written in Perl. I honestly don't know anyone developing in Perl nowadays. Not saying it's a bad programming language but if you are having issues and need a someone to help solve a Dada Mail issue, they might have a hard time if they are completely unfamiliar with Perl. This is just my assumption though and not my experience.

Final Thoughts about Dada Mail

Even though Dada Mail has some shortcomings there are not that many other free email managers out there. Even if you have to spend the $74.95 for a Pro Data Mail license I imagine it would be worth it. (I haven't bought one but I am considering it.)

Between Mailman, phpList, and Dada Mail I strongly lean towards using Dada Mail. Some might argue that you should put in the money for a pro email service such as Aweber, MailChimp, GetResponse, YMLP, etc. Those can get pricey quickly and I know a lot of bloggers and non-profits on tight budgets and I believe Dada Mail would work fine for their needs.

Keep in in mind that it is hard to truly know how good an email list service is until you have actually built up an email list and sent a fair amount of newsletters via the program. That's why this isn't necessarily a review so much as a post about my initial thoughts about Dada Mail. There are a few other email manager clients I haven't tried like OpenEMM and Pommo but I am not sure how much time I want to invest in searching for an email list tool. I will keep people updated and post a more detailed review and even tutorials as I get more into setting up and sending emails through it.

Are you a Dada Mail user? Do you like the software and it's features? What do you think could be improved? Would you like to see a WP plugin for it too? If you used to use Dada Mail what are you using now and why? What did you switch to? I'd be happy to hear compliments and complaints and anything else people recommend.

The other day I was trying out Mailman, a free email manager written in Python. I've also been playing around with another well known email newsletter software known as PHPList.

UPDATE: This post reviews the old version of PHPList. What is pictured here is PHPList version 2 actually. The reason is I installed it is I used a quick installer which doesn't support the newest phpList version 3. It only had the older versions for some reason. The newest version of PHPlist look much cleaner and has a seemingly more well thought out user interface but I think version 2 was actually easier to use. If you are reading this I recommend you use the latest version of phpList so you have the proper security updates and the latest features.

PHPList pegs itself as “The most popular Open Source Newsletter Manager.” This does seem to be the case as they are not that many open source email newsletters programs out there besides Mailman and Dada Mail. At least these are the only 3 that I am aware of that are currently supported by developers and free to install and use on your own server. (Dada Mail requires you to purchase a license fee if you are over 3 lists with 1,000 emails.)

After playing around with PHPList I can see why it has a significant amount of downloads every month and why it's popular. It's not super easy-to-use but at least it has a layout that I think most people can figure out and understand. I had an email list up and running fairly quickly without having to look up too much. I'd say the learning curve is medium but the PHPList forums along with the documentation and a decent amount of video tutorials on the internet should help anybody trying to get started.

As you can see the backend of this email manager isn't going to win any design awards, but it is functional and I can at least understand how to use it. Mailman… not so much and Dada Mail is easy but there are confusing aspects about it as well. It didn't take me too long to send out a test email to see how PHPList works and what you could do. What's nice is that it has an advanced text editor so you can use different fonts, bold words, change colors, etc. and you can attach files. With Mailman you can't attach files which is kind of a big downside.

One big issue with PHPList is that the WordPress plugin that used to be supported for PHPList, WP PHP List, has not been updated for several years. You probably can use another WordPress newsletter plugin to integrate WordPress with PHPlist but I have not tried had time to mess with WP plugins yet to see. It seems like the Newsletter Sign-Up plugin will integrate according to this WP forum post.

What's surprising to me is that PHPList doesn't support an official Worpdress PHPList plugin. Wordpress is the most popular content management system (CMS) and blogging platform on the face of the earth. Matt Mullenweg said at the 2013 State of the Word that 18.9% of websites in the world now run on WordPress. In addition checkout these impressive WordPress stats back when I wrote about the WordPress 10th Anniversary. Bottom line if you want your software to be really successful, you should code a WP plugin for easy integration.

Also there does not seem to be a way to remove the footer image that links to the PHPList site at the bottom of emails. Honestly I don't have a problem with it as it is free and open source software, but I wish I could pay a license fee to remove it. This would be a good money maker for the developers in my opinion. The point of an email newsletter is to promote yourself or your own websites.

Overall I think PHPList is a great way to get an email list started if you are on a tight budget and want greater control over your email lists. You will have to be careful not to send out to many emails and check what your web hosts limits are for sending bulk emails. They will not want to get hit with spam complaints from you sending too many emails and risking getting a blacklisted IP address.

PHPList does have a nice service called PHPList Hosted, which gives you the option to send emails through their email servers. PHPList Hosted currently in beta but the pricing is quite attractive when compared to other email management providers.

For those that want to learn more about this open source email software you can order the book PHPList 2-Email Campaign Manager by David Young. I haven't bought the book but I am it considering it as it is recommend on the PHPList website and includes step-by-step instructions. From what I can tell it will have PHP coding, so you should be aware of that before you buy it.

I will probably post a in-depth review and some tutorials as I get more into using PHPList. Open source is all about sharing your knowledge! 🙂

The 2013 State of the Word was recently presented at WordCamp San Fransisco. State of the Word is an annual presentation given by Matt Mullenweg, the creator of WordPress. He talks about the developments and progress WordPress has made in the past year and the future plans and hopes for the platform.

Even if you don't personally use WordPress and use another content management system (Joomla, Drupal, etc) it is still good to watch the State of the Word's to know what is going on with WordPress. Keep in mind WordPress is the largest content management system (CMS) out there and is getting more popular and more powerful everyday. I don't see this trend changing anytime soon and I don't think any other CMS can catch-up with it's rapid development.

So what is new with WordPress? Apparently the Automattic team has reworked the plugin review system. “Now all ratings are attached to reviews.” commented Mullenweg. Essentially this means nobody can give you 1-star without saying why they think it deserves that rating. Also the plugin author can now respond in a thread to a negative review. If the plugin improves a reviewer can change it. Matt Mullenweg did many 1-star reviews have been changed to 5-star reviews.

Another interesting development is that there will be a WordPress book coming out soon. According to Matt Mullenweg it will the first book to be written on Github, which is for sharing coding databases.

There was also talk about the fact that WordPress will start to become not just a blog/CMS platform but an application platform. Automattic will be focusing more on becoming a developer resource (developer.wordpress.org). Mullenweg thinks of WordPress as a platform that with different building blocks such as a CMS, blog, or e-commerce blocks you can build in or take out as you need.

Matt also talked about the MP6 plugin project within Automattic. I have never heard of this but apparently it changes the user interface administration in the backend of WordPress. You can change colors, it is responsive, and it looks pretty slick from what I could tell.

WordPress 3.8 apparently will feature Luke Skywalker and Automattic hopes to release it sometime in December this year (I think). Mullenweg also said he would like to start releasing the default WordPress theme like automakers. (Automakers release the new model before the year even starts often.)

At the time WordCamp San Francisco took place WordPress 3.6 was not released but was on August 1st, 2013. WordPress 3.6 “Oscar” was named after Oscar Peterson, the great Jazz pianist. In State of the Word 2013 Matt Mulleweg highlighted some of the rising “WordPress rockstars” as he called it that have helped with it's continued development. They did show the video for WordPress 3.6 (which I am running now) and it is sweet!

“Be the change with WordPress.” said Mullwenweg at the end of the presentation. He really encourages people to get involved with helping out in the WordPress community.

Some of the most interesting parts of Matt's State of the Word presentations is when he mentions the growth of WordPress along with some WordPress Stats and numbers. I've tried to organize them here;

WordPress Stats

18.9% of the web now runs on the WordPress platform. This is a 2.2% increase from last year. (Matt mention it should be as popular as Justin Bieber.)

46 million WordPress downloads from (46,355,774) in the last year. 175,000 everyday. (That number does not include automatic scripts installations only downloads from WordPress.org.)

In a WPEngine survey they asked US adults, “Have you heard of WordPress?” 29.7% of survey respondents said “Yes.”

336 WordPress Themes were added to the directory this year. That is 2.3 as many as last year. Impressive considering each theme goes through a theme review process.

1,500 people were active in WordPress Core development over the past year.

30,000 respondents from 178 different countries took part in the WordPress survey. “Community” and “ease-of-use” are what people like the best about WordPress. The least? “Plugins” are the least favorite along with “updates” and “security.”

15 updates for the WordPress mobile apps were released. There were 3 updates for iOS, 6 for Android, and 6 for Windows phones. (Who wants a Windows phone?)

Make.wordpress.org blogs have received 10,945 posts and comments in 2012, which is double the amount since last year.

50,000 blogs that were created 7 days ago on WordPress.com will be active today. That is only a 96% rate of attrition rate of bloggers. They believe this number is higher for WordPress.org users because of the extra steps. Since you have to buy a domain, hosting, and setup a few things yourself.

WordPress Plugin States

Over 40,000 plugins have been relaunched.

9,334 plugins requested to be reviewed in the past year and 6,758 were approved for the WordPress plugin directory by Automattic.

There are now 26,000 WordPress plugins in the directory.

WordPress Usage

98% of people use WordPress on web.

31% use WordPress on an iPad or iPhone

30% use Android mobile phones

18% Android tablets

13% Desktop Apps

What do you use WordPress for?

69% use WordPress as a Content Management System (CMS)

20% Blog/CMS

6% as a Blog

7% as an App platform (new entry this year)

WordCamp Stats

314 WordCamps have been held to date

72 WordCamps have taken place in the past year.

1,026 people have given talks at WordCamp over the past year.

Videos of WordCamp presentations on WordPress.TV have been viewed 1.4 million times. So you better prepare a good talk at WordCamp! 🙂